To:
The Prime Minister and MP's

Repower Port Augusta has a fully costed plan to start a new industry in Australia. There is overwhelming community support for a renewable energy plant in Port Augusta. It will bring new technology there, and if rolled out across the country, will create 140,000 jobs at the height of construction. It gives us 10 to 15 years to sensibly plan a phase out of the fossil fuel industry.

Why is this important?

2013 was the hottest year on record for Australia and the fourth hottest on the planet since records began in 1880. It's getting hotter and hotter.

A report from the (US) National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration states that globally, 2013 is the 37th year in a row with temperatures above the 20th century average. It also states that nine of the 10 hottest years on record have been in the 21st century (2010 is the record holder for hottest year ever).

But in a very sunny, windy Australia we are one of the best-placed nations to do something about reversing the dangerous warming trend!
We can start the rollout of a key renewable technology for Australia, Concentrated Solar Thermal Power plus molten salt storage (CSP+), by replacing the closing dirty-fired coal power stations in Port Augusta with a CSP+ plant! CSP+ is like coal or nuclear power in that it boils water at a very high temperature to create high-pressure steam but unlike coal and nuclear it uses the just the heat from the sun to heat a mixture of two liquid salts which can store the heat and thus be released into a heat exchanger at any time of the day or night to boil water to make electricity. With the right technology the sun can provide electricity 24 hours per day!

The State government cannot pay for this on its own. We have to tell the Federal government to fund and support the State government in the construction of baseload solar at Port Augusta.

It's doable, so we all just have to tell the politicians that this is what we want.

CSP+ provides baseload or dispatchable energy which is the perfect complement to wind, a variable energy provider. CSP+ with wind can provide almost all Australia's energy requirements. Download the Stationary Energy Plan 2020 at www.bze.org.au.